have heard his blafphemy.—What think ye? They anfwered and faid, He is guilty of death.

And before Pontius Pilate the question was the fame, Art thou the king of the Jews?-Jefus anfwered, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then would my fervants fight, that I fhould not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence. Pilate therefore faid unto him, Art thou a king then? Jefus anfwered, Thou fayeft that I am a king: which, as obferved, was his yea to the queftion, and his confeffion to the accufation laid in against him to take his life. Here, alfo, as before the Sanhedrim, and the court of Herod, when he was queftioned in many words, or concerning various matters, he anfwered nothing: but as foon as this point is brought up, and this question is put to him, in every inflance he made an immediate reply and confeffion; for his errand into the world was to bear witness unto the truth.

Pilate was determined to let him go; for, tho' he found the matter of his accufation to be a fact, that Jefus did claim, by the highest authority, to be the rightful fovereign of that ancient kingdom, and therefore, as by the charter given to David, Pfalm lxxii. 8. he was the prince of all the kingdoms of the earth; yet he knew that for envy the people had delivered him, and he had also fome apprehenfion of the divine afpect of the thing: But the Jews cried out, faying, If thou let this man go, thou art not Cefar's friend: whosoever maketh himfelf a king, fpeaketh against Cefar. And the Cefar.And

Evangelifts note that it was this faying that determined Pilate to give judgment in the case.

That this was the matter for which Jefus Chrift was condemned to the crofs is evident from his written accufation, which, according to the Roman custom, in cafes of capital punishment, was fufpended over the fufferer, and therefore called a fuperfcription, and which was this-The king of the Jews. And, doubtlefs, the truth for which Jefus Chrift bled upon the crofs is fimply the gofpel. This is" that thing," that diftin&t thing, confelfed by Peter, in two words,* Luke ix. 20, 21. as it was revealed to him in the words and works of Jefus, which he spake and wrought from the Father, and for which this difciple, Peter, was pronounced bleed.

Hence the Apostle, in giving the gospel charge to Timothy, which is the commandment given to every minifter of Jefus, fays I give thee charge in the fight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Jefus Chrift, who, before Pontius Pilate, witneffed a good confeffion; that thou keep this commandment without fpot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jefus Chrift; which in his times he fhall fhew, who is the bleffed and only potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords.

Here, then, the folemn charge of the minister of God is laid down in the very article which Chrift, as a witness to the truth, confeffed before Pontius Pilate, and which in a future day, called his times,

The Chrift of God:

he will shew in the actual exhibition. And, furely, this commandment, fo given in charge to the minifters of Jefus, is the gofpel merely.

It is evident that good difcourfes may be made upon the fubjects of religion, virtue and morality; particularly, upon the divine perfections, human depravity, the decrees of God, dependence upon divine influences, the nature of exercises, the fshortnefs of time, vanity of the world, moral obligations, fubmiffion to adverfe difpenfations, and a future ftate of rewards and punishments, and numerous other ferious fubjects, without embracing the gospel. The Greeks and other improved nations, poffeffed many very valuable instructions of this nature, long before the gofpel came among them. I say that excellent difcourfes may be made upon these and fuch like important fubjects; and that kingdom and glory which lies at the foundation of the doctrine of Chrift, and which will foon be revealed, to crown the whole divine exhi bition, be left out of view;

ufeful, provided they be gofpel.

and they may

and they may be very not fubftituted for the

But this is another thing; the gospel is diftinctly the king's matter as really a matter of ftate, as was the fubject of the contest between the House of Saul and the House of David.

I mean not, however, to admit that it is proper for a minifter of Chrift, in any discourse, to leave the great fubject of his embaffage out of prominent view: Paul could not do this. It may be hoped that, in this dark day, the lamentable filence which

* Pfalm lxv. 1.

prevails respecting the teftimony of Jesus, in some inftances, is to be imputed to mere mistake and ignorance of what is truth; and this is bad enough, that men fhould run and not be fent; that they should take upon them the infinite responsibility of this ministry, without knowing what is their commission and charge. But it is greatly to be feared that, in most inftances, the latent cause of the evil is that moft malignant one which blinded the Jews, and made their elders and chief priests, whilft fitting in Mofes' feat, and holding the law and the prophets in the highest veneration, pronounce the glorious truth of Jefus Chrift's kingdom, blafphemy; of which truth Mofes and the prophets had fo clearly written.

Alas! How is it, that men who are charged with this commandment, to keep it pure, under the folemnity of a confecrating vow, fhould preach whole years about the gospel, and never so diftinctly as to be understood, preach the gospel itfelf? And alfo write volumes of truths, and fcarcely give one broad hint of the truth.

But notwithstanding this apparent mistake of the moral character of the divine principle for the principle itself; or, to fay the least, notwithftanding the great obscurity respecting the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of the divine foundation; the many clear philofophical demonftrations of truth, from the proposed foundation, in the works particularly referred to, afford convincing evidence that there exifts in the divine fyftem, fome one difcoverable principle, which conftitutes and governs the whole, as really and demonftrably as the power called attraction C

and repulfion is fuppofed to conftitute and gor vern the fyftem of nature. It is evident that these authors wrote under fuch an impreffion, otherwise they would not have attempted to philofophize upon these fubjects. The attention once paid to the vortices, as abfurd as the attempt to found the fyftem upon that doctrine, appears to us, was of great importance. The ingenious writings upon vortices, led naturally to the difcovery of the true operations of the fyftem; and, in the fame direction, our late reafonings upon benevolence, may lead to the ultimate of all our inquiries.

Being very familiar with thefe works from my childhood, they undoubtedly had an influence in imprelling my mind with the belief of the exiftence of fuch a divine principle.-But it was the difcovery of the harmony and analogy of all God's works; and, above all, the declarations in the fcriptures, of the exiftence of a pattern of divine things, which was fhewed Mofes in the Mount, and which, if we will do the truth, we are exprefsly required to refpect-that led me fully to this conclufion:

And if there be a difcoverable first principle in the divine fyftem, which is the exact type or pattern of the whole, and which, in one view, opens a vast eternity, and dicovers the end of the works of God from the beginning, no arguments are necessary to fhew the importance of making the discovery of clearly defining the object, and of efabling the belief of it in the human mind.It is civious that fuch an acenifition must have